Lileks offers some analysis of the immigration bill like only he can:

I. (7) (3.14) There shall be a fence stretching 356 miles. The fence shall be three feet high. Paper mache crocodiles shall reside on the other side, arrayed in a threatening manner ($400,000 shall be appropriated to determine the optimum angle of the opened jaw; the final crocodile shall represent a consensus among herpetologists, and reflect a crocodile who is defending his position but showing his teeth to warn off, and not necessarily threaten violence.) Every nine miles, there shall be a sign that reproduces the FBI warning that precedes all DVDs and videotapes and warns of criminal liability for breaking the copyright law. (It has worked so well thus far the language might as well be used intact.) The fence shall be raised to four feet in the event the population of any state becomes 51% undocumented Xenonationals. The fence shall be raised to five feet in the event GOP presence in the Senate drops below 4 seats. The fence shall be raised to ten feet after a nuclear device is smuggled in from Mexico, providing the yield of the bomb is at least 4 (four) kilotons. A bomb with a yield between 3 and 3.99 kilotons will be a sufficient trigger to raise the fence only if the attendant radiation is carried by prevailing winds a distance greater than 20 miles.

Even better, Lileks reivews the season finale of 24:

UPDATE: THERE MAY BE A MOLE IN CTU. There might also be a prize in each of these specially marked boxes of Lucky Charms. I suspect the rotting corpse of Edgar, using neural implants from the graveyard.

UPDATE: Stupidest question of the year, or ever, from Nadia. “Jack escaped? How?” By using the Power o’ Bauer, lady. If they were smart they’d spell Power P-A-U-E-R. But they don’t, because the covert community is institutionally incapable of public manifestations of gratitude, man.

Update: Dave Barry also reviews the last 2 hours of 24.

UPDATE: Hard to believe such a foolproof, well-thought-out plan could have gone wrong.

UPDATE: "It blew!" Yes, it did.

UPDATE: Just to recap: CTU, the nation's crack counterterrorism unit, which has a huge staff and vast computer capacity as well as helicopters and satellites, and which knew exactly where the bad guys were going to strike, was once again easily defeated, this time by two guys in wetsuits and a motorboat.

UPDATE: I still can't believe Melinda got voted off American Idol.

UPDATE: Another White House scene. Padpadpadpad.

UPDATE: The old Bloomfield Oil Platform! That's IT.

UPDATE: Three Hummers! He's still in the plot!

UPDATE: If anything bad goes down on the oil platform, the actors can just grab chunks of dialog and use them as flotation devices.

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Glenn Reynolds, the easiest-going puppy blending fool on the planet, has finally had enough of Excitable Andy's incessant caterwauling and arguing in bad faith. In short, he's finally come to the same conclusion that the rest of us reached a long time ago:

I've tried, honestly, not to get in these pissing matches with Andrew, but apparently he can't help himself with this stuff. But to be clear: I'm against torture. I'm also against moralistic, dishonest, self-righteous preening about torture. Andrew is a repeat offender in the latter category, and it's gone beyond embarrassing to pathetic.

Various people in and out of the blogosphere have wondered exactly when, how, and why Andrew lost it. But lost it he has.

Dan Collins wonders when the rest of us thought that Andrew had lost it. For me, I think it was the incessant Andrew vs. Andrew posts, wherein he completely contradicted himself in ways that allowed him to screech hysterically about things of which he once approved. I'd be glad to have given him a pass because everyone's allowed to change his or her mind. But the dishonest prick would simply pretend that he'd never taken his prior position and that the rest of us were simply lying.

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Allah reported earlier in the day that Falwell had been found non-responsive in his office. Apparently, he has passed away.

I'll be honest: I always found Falwell a little bit disturbing and creepy. And I say this as one of those evangelical types in good standing with my church. He deserves the credit, as James Joyner rightfully acknowledges, for helping bring religious conservatives into the realm of politics And I actually met the man once, on the day of my graduation from college. It turns out that his daughter was graduating from VCU/MCV's medical school that day and he had parked right next to my sister's car; we all arrived back at our vehicles at the same time.

What's the point? I don't really have one. He seemed nice enough in person, but I never much cared for him. However, he has left family and friends behind who love him and I know that they're grieving. They have my condolences.

Update: Not surprisingly, the sinestrophe side of the blogosphere is popping champagne corks and celebrating. I haven't seen that much happiness from the perpetually aggrieved since Reagan died which, I guess, shows how completely vile, heartless and full of shit those people are.

Update: I know that John Cole, much like me, never liked Falwell, but he's taken the high road:

You all are better than that. And the thing that people need to remember is that despite what we may think of him, a number of people are grieving. If you canÂ’t muster the sympathy to behave decently for their sake, well, I got nothing.

Sadly, not everyone can be bothered to extend sympathy for those who've just lost a loved one. Sadly, but not surprisingly.

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And it's on May 15 this year. The only two flavors are Cinnamon Dulce de Leche or Sticky Toffee Pudding, the latter of which is really delicious. So go next week to your local Haagen-Dazs.

Update: Date corrected to May 15.

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Okay, it was only about 35 minutes, not a whole weekend, but I had my role as navigator revoked as a result. I'm still not certain if the revocation is permanent or not.

Anyway. My buddies and I drove down to Raleigh recently for the World Beer Festival. The weather was pretty much perfect for an outdoor festival: it was sunny and the temperature was in the low 70s. And there were lots of breweries, most of which had beers which ranged from good to great. Abita, Sierra Nevada, Chimay and lots of others besides. Also, there was a lot of good food, which proved useful in washing down the beer.

So we sipped and supped for a few hours, being careful to not become drunk because we had to drive back home to Richmond, and then we hiked back to the car and got started on our return journey. And this is where the... fun began.

I remember getting into the front seat and relaxing, closing my eyes a bit while the three of us started some chit chat about Highlander cards and-

I DID mention that they were friends of mine, right? You shouldn't be surprised at nerd games being discussed. Probably none of you are.

- then everything kind of blanked out for a while. For me. To me, I was asleep. Oddly, and unfortunately for my friends in the car with me, I continued to speak. According to them -and I have no reason to doubt- I even waved my hand in front of the driver's face a couple of times to see if he was awake.

I know what you're thinking: this sounds like something that I could be mocked about, but no real harm done. That's where you'd be wrong. In my somnolent, yet conversant, state, I apparently replied a couple of times to, well, here's a sample of what was said:

Driver: Are you sure that we're going the right way?

Me: Sure, you're fine.

Well, the statement was true as a point of fact. Jeff was fine and dandy. Physically. However, we were NOT going the right way. In fact, we were going in what would best be described as the opposite of the right way. We wanted to go north and we were seeing signs for US-1, south, which sort of tipped us off. And by us, I include myself because I finally woke up. Despite assertions to the contrary, my higher brain functions were not working during that period. You could make the argument that they never work, but that's a different argument. In any event, we stopped at a Quickie Mart or something and asked the guy how to get to I-95. He wasn't sure, but he did laugh out loud when we told him where we wanted to go.

To the backseat I went. Being fully awake now, I made some comments about which exit to take, which lane to be in; my sister lives in Raleigh and I'm more than little familiar with the area. To each comment, Jeff asked, "So other guy not named Physics Geek, which way do we go? Or is the cause of our 1-1/2 hour delay in getting home actually correct this time?"

The mocking is certain to follow me to my grave, but it's well deserved. I'm still curious as to how I managed to give the appearance of being awake while not actually being so. It would allow me to catch up on my sleep at work. Then again, sleeping next to the Big Red Button would get me fired, so maybe I'll think on it a little more.

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If you haven't been reading Annika lo, these many years, you've been missing out. Anyway, her blogging is circling the drain as she heads towards her new career- after the bar- as a lawyer. I'll miss her posts, her pictures and her sense of humor. And I'll never forget that she was the first blogger to leave a comment or add me to her blogroll. Not because I deserved the attention, mind, but just because she's cool like that.

In any event, here's a post in which she links to the Round Mound of Retard, and then makes a pretty cogent observation about SloMoRo:

There is no convincing one who has abandoned all reason and logic in exchange for fear and superstition.

I think that she left out the part about the parasite attacking Rosie's tiny brain, but otherwise the comment was spot on.

Posted by: Physics Geek at 03:10 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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